What to do about Nico

[Emily Littleton] It is unseasonably warm and windy. The wind rattles newspapers, strips them from people's hands -- did you know that some people, with their iPads and iPhones and wifi and bluetooth still carried the daily pages, probably more out of habit than anything else -- and tosses them down the streets with abandon. It pulls leaves from trees, casts them about like bits of refuse. It pushes against broad and narrow backs alike. It toys with passers-by's hair. Steals El tickets. Whispers lies.

The storm over middle America is threatening big things for Halloween week. People are talking about the Halloween blizzard. Arm-chair weather-manning the next big calamity. Did you hear that happened the same year as the Perfect Storm?

Emily was not of a mood or of a mind to deal with public transport on her way out to the House, so she had driven herself, prayed a little at starting her car, which had sat too long unused and unmoved. She and Chuck had made arrangements to help cover each other's sentry rounds -- when she had class on her days, he'd fill in; when he had work on his, she would. The House of Leaves had dwindled, but they sorted things out and kept their own well enough. So she's switched places with the Vdept and settled in for a long, hopefully quiet night at the House. There's a tomato-sharp smell of dinner simmering on the stove for whomever drops by. Spaghetti Marinara.

Emily is upstairs in the library, pouring over some tome of Quintessential workings. She is close, so very close to mastering the second rank of her Tradition's key Art. Something has pushed her onward, rekindled that Unrelenting need to know. The door to the Library stands open so she can hear the comings and goings of the Chantry members below.

The Initiate is not dressed for University today. She wears dark trousers, neatly pressed, that hold their creases even this late in the evening. A pale pink shirt, button down, with a crisp collar and cuffs. Her hair is pulled back in a neat spiral, secured by clips that defy the high winds. Only a curl here or there has escaped.

She looks put together, professional, immaculately presentable... on first blush. But there is a something weary and darker lingering behind that carefully crafted front. God willing, she would survive her rounds without anyone asking after it; without anyone noticing.

[Ashley McGowen] There's something that thoroughly charmed Ashley about being able to wear shorts in late October. It was certainly warm enough today, though the evening breezes are going to nip at the bare skin of her legs when she leaves the chantry; she doesn't mind.

Ashley deliberately drops by the chantry house on days when she knows Emily has patrol. The purpose for this is twofold: she gets to see Emily, and Emily cooks a lot when she's in the house. It's a night when Ashley isn't eating a meal scrounged together out of rice and stray vegetables. Last night she had oatmeal. One of these days she'll teach herself to cook, or she'll just persist in skidding from friends, as she calls it.

She and Zane enter through the back door, because she hasn't come up the front lawn in (very nearly) two months now. She's dressed in a pair of brown shorts with a plaid pattern and a red T-shirt, and neither of these articles of clothing conceal the fact that she and Zane are both splotched with mud. They've been walking for a while; some of it has dried on her skin like flaking warpaint. The drizzle outside has run some of it off. There's a soccer ball, likewise muddy, tucked under her arm between her elbow and hip.

The dog, who can't be counted on to not get mud all over everything, is left outside with a pat under the chin and a kiss on the muzzle (which no one else would ever get to see.) She steps inside and pauses, listening for the tell of footsteps anywhere in the house.

When she doesn't hear them she calls "Hey Emily, you in?"

[Emily Littleton] Each of the Sentries did for the house what they could. Emily cooked. She left leftovers in the fridge for other people to eat. By now, they all knew that whoever followed her on the rotation didn't have to worry where their dinner would come from. Sometimes she cleaned. But mostly she existed, took up space, breathed in air, and was present on the off-chance that something uninvited came knocking. She knew from experience that if it did come, on her watch, there'd be little to nothing she could do about it. And yet, the once-Orphan was here, holding down her rounds like any other Initiate-and-up on the roster.

"I'll be right down," she answers, slipping a thin ribbon marker into the tome and leaving it closed on the table as she leaves the room. The door closes behind her. There is no one else in the Library. Her footsteps on the stairs presage her presence in the long hallway that leads to the kitchen.

"Hey, Ashley," Emily says, when they meet up in that space. Emily is precise, neat, tidily attired. Ashley is mucked up and wearing shorts. They're quite a pair. The Singer pretends to not notice much. "I'm making pasta for dinner. Do you want some?"

Just like she pretends not to notice that Ashley appears around mealtimes on her sentry days. Maybe Emily doesn't mind the company. Maybe it's even welcome; it's hard to read the younger mage most days and today is no exception.

[Jacques-Marcel] It's been a long time since he's knocked at this door. Back then he'd have just walked in, but enough time has changed, plenty has happened, that he decides caution is the better idea here. Standing at the front door, he's wiping raindrops from his sleeves and tossing his hair back from his face. On the street behind him is a blue Z4, something more suited to the glass and chrome rather then this humble house.

Dressed in a pair of slacks, a nice buttoned down shirt and leather loafers, its the small details that make up the designer labels. He's neat, tailored appearance is just that - tailored for a specific purpose, and usually that is to be pleasing enough for the eye but humble enough to blend in. Cuts and styles comes with the profession, but the attitude is something else entirely.

Waiting for the door to be answered, he slides a hand in his pocket and fidgets with the lighter hidden there with the cigarette packet. He doesn't know what to expect when that door opens, but it can't be any worse then his track record. Calling first would have been a good idea, but he's too proud for that.

[Emily Littleton] There is a knock on the door. Few people knock on the Chantry door. Emily makes a quick apology and slips off in the direction of the front room.

When the door swings open, that aperture is blocked by a slight woman's frame. She's tall, standing five-foot-nine in her socks today. She's dressed professionally, if not as smartly and precisely as Jacques himself. They don't know each other, but they've crossed paths at least once before.

In a parking lot. At a Best Buy.

"Good evening," Emily says, and her voice is touched through with Otherness. Most notably is the British tinge that colors it, but there are other accents that pull it away from true. "May I help you?"

She has every name on the admit list memorized. If he offers up one of them, then she'll step away from the door and allow him entrance. There's nothing directly imposing about her, nothing in the way that she stands that immediately refuses or rebukes him, but there's a surety and an immovable Grace to her as well.

A polite smile covers her weariness.

[Ashley McGowen] Ashley holds up the ball in both hands in front of her, opens her mouth, and is about to make her reply when the knock on the door comes. Her gaze, too, darts off in the direction of the doorway, wanders down the hall; it's true that very few people knock on the door these days. Israel and Solomon did once, back when they hello'd the house (an age ago, now.)

She doesn't follow Emily to the door, though. Maybe disheveled and muddy is a state she is comfortable with Emily seeing her in but not most of the rest of the magi who'd come calling. Ashley isn't any easier to read, most days.

So she waits in the kitchen, and hovers near the stove, and then she washes her hands clean of mud and dirt, setting the soccer ball down near the door. She sets a kettle on the stove. She drinks mostly tea, and even though it's warm enough outside that the hot liquid won't be as welcome as it usually would be this time of year, it's habit for her.

[Jacques-Marcel] When the door opens, his attention drifts back towards it. He looks her over with blue-gray eyes, it's a quick glance, that brings his gaze up to her face. He doesn't recognize her right away. She's familiar in a sense, but he places it as one of many faces that he's come across in the world, easily forgotten.

Last time he was here, Martha was still around. He'd been used as one of the go-to people when the Chantry was concerned, some sort of messenger that hung around fairly often then not. Then things got weird, crazy, and the Magi became more involved with the place, leaving him to slip into the background. He much preferred that.

"Good evening," he smiled at her. "I'm Jacques-Marcel." His last name is Delacroix and maybe that's on the list of names.

Then he pauses. He hadn't rehearsed what he was going to say. In fact he's not even sure what to say now that he's here, only that he wanted to make an appearance and follow up on what Ashley had told him only a few days ago. "I'm a friend of Ashley's," that seemed like a good path to go down, even if the term friend is highly stretched.

[Emily Littleton] The man on the porch tenders a name on the cleared list, connects his own with one that is familiar to Emily. Then he smiles, and pauses. That's all it takes.

Emily steps out of the doorway and waves him on inside. So much for staunch security. Or maybe the Initiate knows something he doesn't. "I'm Emily," she says, and her tone is warmer by degress. "Welcome."

She'll close the door behind him, but Emily does not offer to take his coat lest she be confused for some sort of porter or handmaid. She glances at him, long enough to catch his eyes, and then heads back toward the kitchen from where the smell of Italian food emanates clearly.

"I was just about to set out dinner. You're welcome to join if you'd like," she tells him. Emily does not say Ashley's here. She will let the Adept's reaction corroborate the newcomer's story.

[Ashley McGowen] Ashley hears Emily speaking with someone at the door - a man, she can tell by the lower timbre - but her inability to distinguish pitch with any effectiveness makes it very difficult to tell who it is. Especially at this distance. But things seem to have gone well, or at least there isn't any yelling, so Ashley relaxes and lingers near the teakettle and sets out mugs. After a moment's thought she adds a third.

"I came to see if you wanted to play football," Ashley can be heard telling Emily when the Chorister makes her reappearance, "but it's pretty muddy outside." And Emily's clothes didn't look like the soccer-playing variety. After a moment she raises her head to regard whoever comes into the kitchen after Emily, and when she sees that it's Jacques her eyebrows raise a fraction. She hadn't expected him at all, much less this soon.

Jacques is one of the people Ashley would rather did not catch her mud-splattered, but there's not much for it now. She readies herself for comments - or rather, makes herself more ready for them than she is normally. "Hey Jacques," she says, after a beat.

[Jacques-Marcel] "Thank you."

Wiping his feet, he steps inside. There's no jacket to hang up, his sleeves are short in mind of warmer weather. Only enough rain had dappled across him from his walk from the car at the curb to the front of the house.

"No thank you. I've already ate." But he does follow her towards the kitchen, not immediately on her heels, but wandering quietly in her wake. His gaze scans around, taking in any changes that's immediately obvious. It feels strange to be under the same roof with different people, strangers.

Inside the kitchen there's pasta cooking and one muddy Ashley preparing some drinks. His mouth curves into a slow smile, and he doesn't quite manage to keep the mirth out of his eyes, or the way there's this vague smugness to the curl at his mouth. Thankfully it doesn't last long.

"Hello Ashley." He tucks his hands into his slack pockets in an attempt to make him look more casual and less threatening, perhaps picking up on her growing tension. It's not as if it's his lean frame that is ever the threat anyway.

[Emily Littleton] "I've a change of clothes in my car," she tells the Adept, and the smile she's wearing broadens and warms significantly at the promise of her favorite sport. "So the mud is no bother."

She doesn't say that this place has trained Emily to expect the worst. She doesn't say that there's a light firearm in her schoolbag.

"I wouldn't mind a match, either. I came straight here from hospital today." Emily leaves that little hook for Ashley to notice, or not, but moves away from it rather quickly. As if it were just an incidental thing. Maybe she had work at a hospital, doing some variant of database management or IT consulting.

The Singer doesn't appear to study the interaction between the other two, but she's definitely mindful of it. Ashley knew his name, though, and hadn't overheard it. Her watchful sentinel duties have been fulfilled.

"Other than football, what brings you two by?"

[Ashley McGowen] Ashley had something she'd wanted to speak to Emily about. It's unpleasant, and she suspects that the Singer's reaction will likewise be; there's a glance toward Jacques, though, to whom the information wouldn't be pertinent, as far as she knows. She doesn't even realize that Jacques knows Nico at all. If it had been an option she would rather have left the evening to playing soccer and not mentioned it at all, given it just one more day, but a chantry leader doesn't have that luxury. Putting off news could be dangerous, could be a security breach.

She sighs after a moment and runs a hand back through her hair only to find a slick of mud on the side of her head that hasn't dried yet. She looks at it on her palm as though in surprise and then turns so she can wash her hand again in the sink.

So instead of mentioning the business she came here on, she looks once at Jacques as though to ask him the same question herself. Only to follow up with, "The hospital? Why were you there?"

[Jacques-Marcel] Hospital. That grabs his attention, and it swings immediately to Emily to look her over again, this time a little more critically. "Are you a nurse, Emily?" The tone is mild, but his interest is not. He doesn't peg her as a doctor, but goes for the stereotype instead. He briefly thinks of Ashton, wonders if she's still around and comes to the Chantry. He could call her. Really, he shouldn't get anymore involved then he is already. It's a hard lesson learned.

His glance goes to Ashley as they ask similar questions. There's this twist in his gut and this sinking feeling that follows it.

[Emily Littleton] This convergence of individuals is coincidental. It has to be. But after a few more hours have passed, it's unlikely that the Singer will view it entirely as happenstance. She rests her hands on the counter behind her, leans back a little. It's the first chance either of them have to read the closely-kept tiredness to her frame. The girl is also a Life mage; there are things she can do to hide that weariness that go well beyond clearly crafted lies these days.

"No, I'm not. Actually, I'm an engineer," she says, as if the two fields could not be any more diverse. She rolls her lower lip between her teeth for a moment then sighs, quietly. "A friend of mine is in ICU at Mercy."

There's a glance for Ashley, here. A meaningful one. Something that anchors that friendship to a mutual party. Something that pushes just enough to let the Adept begin to worry, and worry she should.

"Actually, Ash, I was meaning to find you. I need to go Tass hunting. I'm so, so close to being able to make the charms that Israel can. Maybe that will help..."

She's voicing a problem, but this time the Initiate also has a potential solution to it. Like as not, that's what's been keeping her up in the Library studying. Like as not, that's what has scored the weariness so deep into her bones that they could all but read it through her skin.

[Ashley McGowen] A friend, says Emily, and her eyes find Ashley's in that way that suggests that it's a mutual friend, and Ashley's first thought is Kage. That's the one that makes the muscles in her chest tighten, because even if she wouldn't admit it she's been afraid. But if it were Kage she would likely have been called long before now, and probably called first. Ashley's second thought is Jarod: she just saw him yesterday. It's a possibility and would explain why Emily doesn't expand.

But it could be a lot of people, so she pushes any of the conclusions she could have jumped to from her mind. "Who was it?" she asks, and for all that fear that struck her through seconds ago when she thought of Kage, her voice is cool.

"We could arrange to go look for it easily. Just let me know when you're free," she says, a few seconds later.

[Jacques-Marcel] ICU at the Mercy.

He's really studying Emily now. Ashton, Alex. Alex, Nico. Emily, Ashley. He knows her now, somewhere vaguely along with some others he met outside a store, when he'd bumped into Alex again. He hasn't seen the man in awhile, but had seen Nico only earlier that morning, very briefly.

Glancing away from her, he looked over to where the cups were on the counter. Both hands comb through his hair, push it back. Stress lines flicker, coming and going. As his hands drop, he moves over towards a chair at the table, lifting to pull it out rather then drag it across the ground. Easing himself to sit before he turns to lead, Jacques is quiet in the background, leaving the two women to talk as he comes to terms with several thoughts running behind that handsome facade.

[Emily Littleton] Jacques is searching her, looking for someway to forge a connection to who she is, who she was, how they might know the same people -- beyond the Dean, of course -- and the weight of that attention might bother some people. It might make an already stressful situation all the more unbearable. Emily weathers it, returns the interest with a slightly furrowed brow and less immediate alarm.

"I'm free as soon as I'm done with rounds," she tells Ashley with that sort of stupid, single-minded distraction that young people get when they think their immediate problem is the only thing wrong with the world at all. And that by staying up for more hours of the day they can effect a quicker resolution. It's a faulty idealism, logic motivated by emotion not rationality. That narrows the pool of potential people even further.

"Nico," she tells Ashley, but she's still watching Jacques with naked curiosity. The Orphan's name is a sigh, a bit of a whisper. There's worry and regret wrapped up in it. Emily reaches up to rub at the back of her neck.

"Is that tea?" she asks, knowing full well that was what the Adept was brewing. She needs the side-step. She needs a moment to draw everyone's eyes away from her. "I would love some, if you don't mind."

[Ashley McGowen] It's regrettable, but Ashley has at this moment forgotten that Jacques is here. The threat of someone else being hurt - probably someone else she cares about, or at least would feel some passing sadness for - has absorbed her attention right at this moment. Ashley very much believes (not accepts, they're different) that the bonds she has with others are a temporary thing; if she doesn't lose a person the way she lost Daiyu, conflict drives people apart, and they pursue their own growth above all else. That doesn't mean she's entirely prepared for it.

So when Emily says Nico, there is a small part of her that is a little relieved, amid all the dismay. Amid the curse that drops from her lips and splatters on the floor to fill the room. She doesn't know Nico is a diabetic, so her first assumption is that she should have talked to Emily about what she came her to talk to her about much, much sooner. After a second she shakes her head.

"What did he do?" she asks, and the kettle by now is beginning to whistle and hop, so she pours it into the teapot and allows it to steep for the three of them. There's a pause. "Jacques, you want any?"

[Jacques-Marcel] "I took him to the hospital last week," he says out of nowhere, speaking aloud - to both of them, or just getting it off his chest. "He said it was diabetic complications. Hates hospitals." Thoughts come out quietly. Ashley's heard him talk before, she knows his accent well enough, can be labeled as some educated, old world family that raised their fortunes in New Orleans. It still sticks despite being out of the place for years now.

Slouching leaves his long legs off to the side, crossing at the ankles. The bone juts out from his wrist from where it rests on the edge of the table, long fingers drumming once, twice. His arm is lightly tanned. He looks from his own watch over to the two, one and then the other, back again.

Drawing in a breath, he steals himself. "Was it really a car accident? Or is this Dylan all over again?"

"No. Thank you, Ashley." Voice lower this time.

[Emily Littleton] "He told me," she says, to Jacques. There's an underscore of gratitude to it, even though Nico was not hers to mind or look after. Sometimes it was enough that there were other people in the world who were willing to look out for friends or strangers. That the planet was not wholly populated by assholes. Her voice is quieter, though. A little softer.

"I overheard some medical students in the canteen the night he was admitted," she tells them. There's a careful detachment to it. Emily doesn't explain how she'd known where he was, or happened upon the med students between rounds. They were left to guess at her methods and motives. "I... don't know for certain, but I doubt it. They said it was largely inconsistent with an em-vee-cee."

Dylan's name makes her wince. Especially because Jacques does not wield it like some artifact or example. It's just a name on his tongue; it's still human. It makes Emily sad.

[Ashley McGowen] There's a glance flicked over her shoulder at Jacques when the consor mentions that he'd taken Nico to the hospital last week. Not only does he know Nico, but he apparently knows him well - and given that she knows Jacques' proclivities and she and Nico had a discussion themselves, drinking by the lake, about the LGBT lifestyle and being Awake, maybe she's already drawn her own conclusions.

She also knows that Dylan was a little reckless. Because he told her, and because she herself witnessed the man in a hydrocone stupor the day she came over to Jacques' house. "MVC?" she echoes, with a glance toward Emily. Who probably doesn't know any more about medical jargon than she does. "I doubt it's like Dylan, Jacques. Nico seems pretty careful to me."

The Hermetic turns away from them both, because the tea is done steeping, and she pours some into a mug for herself and Emily. The first mug is passed to the Singer, and she stops to spoon some honey from a jar into her own before resealing the lid and turning back to them. Her eyes have a pensive, thoughtful look that passes when she looks back at them both.

"Nico told me what happened to him when he was in South Dakota," she says. "There was, I guess, this woman who didn't really realize she was Awake, but she started doing some 'tests' on Nico because he was like her. She wanted to figure out how his brain worked. She tortured him." There's a look toward Emily then, something that sticks and holds. "Owen found him, and she got him too. Owen's back in Chicago but he didn't want anybody to know."

She pauses ostensibly so that she can sip at her tea, but it's mostly to give both of the others space in which to process her words. Then she says, "I'm pretty sure Nico has Jhor. Everything's...really consistent with what I remember happening to me, when I had it. And I wouldn't be surprised if Owen did too. It's bad for either of them to be on their own, especially right now. That's why I mention it."

[Jacques-Marcel] Being that he's not awake and hasn't really spent that much time around the Magi when they're discussing all these sorts of things, despite having a sister that is part of the Order - one whom he has never discussed, most of this goes over his head. Jhor. He has no idea what it is or what it does, only that it's important by the way Ashley emphasizes that neither Owen or Nico should be alone.

He doesn't say anything. He's thinking plenty. But this isn't a discussion he can be an active part of, only listen to.

While Ashley may not believe that Dylan and Nico are alike, from Jacques stand point they are far too similar. Enough that he's really considering taking a huge step back and not be involved in any of it. Forget dates, forget hospital visits. He remembers well enough what happened last time. It's all fresh, this wound he's studiously trying to ignore. There are reasons that, up until now, he had not approached the Chantry. And that he's only here because Ashley had told him they are making a place to honour the dead.

But of course, life gets complicated before he gets a chance for that sort of closure. Life with Magi, he's realized, is anything but simple.

[Emily Littleton] [Subterfuge (Evasion): dif 8, cuz, issues, n, stuff]
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 1, 1, 1, 3, 6, 7, 7 (Botch x 3 at target 8)

[Jacques-Marcel] (ooc: Ouch!)

[Emily Littleton] [haha. oh god. *gets to typing*]

[Emily Littleton] MVC?

"Motor Vehicle Crash."

It's said numbly. It's said before Ashley has a chance to carry on. It's going to be the only Emily offers in answer to what Ashley has to say. Her hands are wrapped around the mug that Ashley has passed over, heedless of the heat. Her head stays bowed. Her thumbs skim over the mug's handle, trace it, give moment to the brooding expression she might have learned from Owen himself.

There's a lump in her throat that she has to swallow back, and Emily isn't deft enough to hide how much this bothers her. It flickers across her expression, plain as daylight. Instead of drinking from her tea, she sets it on the counter beside her. Brings her hands back to rest on the roll of the counter's edge.

"Oh," says the Singer.

Just, oh.

Then: "They're grown men. I don't really know what you expect me to be able to do about it." This is hurt, it's defensive and tries to push her friend away. Deflect. It's about as artless as Ashley has ever seen Emily. "I'm just -- I'm trying to get Nico out of hospital. Having him there can't be helping either of them. After that, Jhor or not, I haven't the foggiest what to do. I doubt they even want my help."

[Ashley McGowen] Jacques is silent, and Emily...well, Ashley can tell how upset Emily is by the news, even with the difficulties that she has with these sorts of things. It's all written across Emily's expression, it's there in the words she chooses. In a way this is of a greater help to Ashley than if she had to guess at Emily's feelings about the matter; she doesn't have to think, Oh, if I heard this I would be upset, she doesn't have to try to imagine what it's like to be someone else. These things are difficult for her.

She doesn't take offense at Emily's tone. Perhaps she knows it's just because the Singer is hurt. "No, that's the thing with Jhor," Ashley says, "is that you just...you kind of feel dead. That might be why Owen said he wanted his presence kept quiet, because it's hard to care about anything when you have it. It wants to be fed, and you get over it by trying to do things that make you feel alive, but that isn't easy when you have it, so it just kind of spirals." It's clear that Ashley is speaking from personal experience. Jacques wasn't there to witness the six months when she was trapped in the Jhor Quiet, but Emily most certainly was.

There's a pause and her brows furrow. "But yeah. Getting Nico out of the hospital is probably a good start. They probably just had to tell the hospital staff that it was a car crash, and it was probably something else." Ashley herself hasn't gone into an emergency room in years; even if most of the injuries she's had wouldn't draw uncomfortable questions, her medical records certainly would.

With the sort of head injuries she had at eighteen, she shouldn't be able to talk or think with the kind of clarity she does. She shouldn't be able to do anything. Life with magi really isn't simple.

[Jacques-Marcel] Emily gets upset and he's wondering how she's involved with the two other men. Of course all his initial labels are probably wrong, but he's not a very communicating sort. He's rather judgmental about these things and, usually, quite opinionated with them. Plenty has changed, plenty hasn't too.

He hasn't moved much from where he is, sitting relatively still. The occasional tap of his fingers is almost silent. His mouth quirks, gnawed at by sharp teeth at the inside of his lower lip, as he watches, back and forth between the two of them.

"Jhor is flirting with suicidal then? Thrill seeking without the care for risks." Not quite similar to his back ground, but he's been in rehab three, four times over, and knows something about that numbness that pushes people to greater exploration.

"Ashton's a good doctor," he offers them both. "If you can somehow get them out of hospital. Though I don't see how given the state he is in. Unless you want to see about getting a transfer. I think Ashton works at a different hospital. She could help speed things up. She tried for..." Trailing off, he shrugs, leaving it at that. "Better under her care then somebody who will find it suspicious."

[Emily Littleton] Emily doesn't know how to tell Jacques that Ashton is away at a Medical Conference without snapping at the man who, by all rights, has earned none of her scorn. This welling up of hurt and frustration isn't for him. So she bites her tongue and she waits until something more helpful coalesces.

"I'll try to get ahold of her," she says. It isn't hopeful. "If I can't, maybe Israel can. Or maybe Israel can come up with a way to help him. It took me all sodding night to get up to his room, so I doubt their security will just let us check him out on his own recognizance but that -- well, that's if Nico doesn't do that part of on his own out of sheer bull-headedness."

She knows, from talking with Chuck, that Nico didn't stay in the hospital anywhere near as long as he should of after being admitted for complications with his disease and if it weren't unethical and invasive, Emily would consider scanning his pattern every damned time they saw each other.

Of course, this protectiveness is not due to Nico's friendship with her. It's that he is the single most important person on this planet to Owen, who has also been missing and tormented, who is likely also suffering under the weight of this death taint, whom Emily has missed more than she'd ever dare to admit aloud.

"Is there a book I can read, something, anything, Cliff's Notes on Jhor? I don't think Nico trusts me enough to let me help him with something like that," here her gaze drifts over to Jacques-Marcel. Lingers there hopefully. Wonders but does not ask. "I might be able to get through to Owen."

That sounds like a very big maybe. It's heavier than Emily rightfully wants to bear. But she will not abandon a friend and cabalmate, at least not until they're well enough for her to smack them for their stupidity before she bails.

"Oh, Ashley. Chuck & I extended an offer to Nico to join House of Leaves. He didn't answer before all of this happened. Until we get a definite no, we're just going to consider him part of our group."

This is said matter of factly but there's a great deal of political subtext backing it. For a moment, this is not a distraught co-ed talking to a friend, or an Initiate and an Adept. This is a Diplomat's daughter, an Emissary, a Council member carefully and deftly bending a rule in her favor. Perhaps the Dean would be willing to conspire, or at least look the other way, should emergency access to the Node or Library be needed by the Orphan in this interim period.

And if Nico didn't like it? Well, then, he could argue it when he's well.

[Ashley McGowen] Ashley is about to mention to Jacques that Ashton is gone; she hasn't heard from the Euthanatos in months. Then again, given Ashton's manner of retreating into her home and her mundane life, Ashley isn't sure whether Ashton is back or not. There's just a sigh when the doctor's name comes up. "Israel should know about this anyway." She doesn't know about the Orphan's tendency to not take care of himself; Ashley isn't empathic enough, doesn't have enough caretaker instincts, to notice these things.

The only reason she noticed Nico's Jhor at all was when he told her what happened in South Dakota and seemed alarmingly detached. Being able to place that alone was a stretch for her; it was almost impossible for her to realize that there was something wrong with him when none of it was shown on his face.

"Jhor doesn't necessarily mean you get suicidal. I mean, it does for some people, but sometimes you start wanting to destroy other things. It's just that - fascination with death and destruction. You can't reconcile it so you immerse yourself in it and it becomes you." Ashley reaches both hands around and clasps them together at the back of her neck, the way people protect their heads during an earthquake or a tornado. She smooths them forward as though she could squeeze out tension, and sighs. "You could ask Wharil. The Euthanatos know a lot about it. I don't know for sure that this is what's going on, but it's one of those things where even suspecting it is enough to keep an eye on them. While it's still kind of under our control."

There is some subtle condescension there: Ashley overcame hers. She's exceptionally strong willed, and there are plenty of people who are not. While she doesn't believe either Nico or Owen are, necessarily, too weak to handle it, the possibility is always there.

There's a look toward Emily when she asks about Nico joining her cabal, and Ashley...pauses. And looks up. Emily can see her weighing things, considering, and then she bites the inside of her cheek. "If you're just going to consider him part of your group," she tells Emily, "I'm going to hold you both responsible for him, if he has Jhor. I don't want to isolate him, but I don't want him having access to the node unless he's being watched very, very carefully. Understood?"

[Jacques-Marcel] Israel he doesn't know, has never met. But he's rapidly learning names and diseases, or frames of mind, or magic backlashes that he's never been privy to before. This isn't why he came here but it's proving to be more than just interesting. This, if he's willing, may be able to help him redeem some of his own guilty conscience. That is, of course, if he doesn't turn his back on Nico like he had planned on doing the moment he left the hospital, like he was before.

When Emily looks at him, he knows what it means, and has a split second to decide what he's going to do and how he wants to be perceived, which can be two entirely different things. Whatever he decides, has him nodding slightly to her. "I'll see what I can do," he tells her quietly.

But he's going to have to learn how to do this, combat whatever this Jhor is, which leaves him listening to Ashley and watching her as she explains more about it and who else to speak to about the problem. Wharl is another familiar name, which is comforting in its odd way, to know that not everyone is new faces.

"How do you break the cycle, Ashley?"

[Emily Littleton] There is some quiet understanding brokered here. First between the Sorceror and the Singer, then between the Dean and the Emissary. They were beginning to form some semblance of a plan. There were clear steps forward here; this was helpful. It was helping. God, she hoped it was helping.

She offers a nod to Jacques. It doesn't carry the hubris it might were this a few years deeper into her Awakened career. There is still gratitude and humility to her. There's still room for grace.

"Thank you, Jacques-Marcel." Emily doesn't trip over pronouncing his name. It's precisely as he'd offered it to her. Pristine. And for Ashley? "I understand. We will take responsibility for him -- and for Owen, as suspicion is enough, you said -- and watch them accordingly."

Then Emily falls quiet to listen to more of what Ashley has to say. At some point, she turns the heat off under the pasta sauce and makes her way toward the table to sit. She, too, carefully and quietly draws out a chair. When she sits, she rests her elbow on the table, hunches forward a little, and toys with her tea mug intermittently.

[Ashley McGowen] There's this question from Jacques, and at this point Ashley sighs and takes a sip of her tea. It's finally cool enough to drink, but she isn't having much of it; just that sip, and then she sets it behind her on the counter. She rests her elbows on the counter top, leaning back into it such that one might be led into thinking she's relaxed. She's not. Ashley never really is: Tytalan training dies hard.

It isn't easy for her to articulate, this process. She doesn't know much about Jhor aside from her very personal experience, and she knows what she did to overcome it. It makes her vulnerable, this conversation, and there's no way to avoid that no matter the inflection of her voice or the steadiness of her expression and hands.

"Well, you have to do stuff that makes you feel alive, like I said. Not just things you enjoy, like hobbies...I'm talking like...moments that are really life-affirming for you. Like connecting with other people or living things, or doing something that completely exhilerates or impassions you. It's hard for somebody with Jhor to do all that at first because it's harder than usual to feel things, or to care about any of it. It happens really slowly. Like transitioning from winter to summer."

It's an odd simile to illustrate her concept, but Ashley doesn't bat an eye in using it. She takes another sip of her tea, trying to set examples forth. "Like...I don't know. I guess it'd depend on the person. Sex, falling in love, doing the thing you live to do, adventuring and thrillseeking...stuff like that. All of it helps."

[Jacques-Marcel] Leaning forward, he sets his other arm on the edge of the table, cupping his hands loosely together. He's watching Ashley go through her moment of vulnerability, but unlike earlier he's not throwing her any smirking smiles or even making smart ass remarks. Their bickering has been put to the side, like it had in previous moments in the past when things had gotten tough and they came together to talk, plan - just like this.

"I understand," he tells her. "I've had to do similar things with rehab. It's not easy and I don't know Nico that well. But I'll do what I can. I already told him I'll take him on a weekend away." Jacques admits these things easily, and he does so without that same sort of hurt, worry or thought that the others have shown. Sometimes it's hard to tell what is the truth and what is a lie from the Consor, because he's such a blank book on the outside and can be frank about such sordid details that one has to wonder if it's shock value or truth. Ashley's seen it. But to Emily, who doesn't know him any better, he might simply be seen as one of those very open people.

"I'll just have to pick his brain and see what place might inspire him, more then it does me." There's that selfishness, but it also comes with a light curl of his mouth, expressing that he knows that much, and that the mirth is at his own expense.

It fades quickly enough. "It still leaves us with the problem of how he's going to get out of the hospital in the first place. I've got a spare room and can arrange it so that I'm home often enough, " pausing, he glances over to Emily, "unless you think it's a better idea to have him stay with yourself or Owen."

"I'm not sure that it's a good idea to have them in their own company, alone though. Two minds down the same path is sure to end only in destruction. I know that well enough." Drug addicts can not be around their own kind. Temptation is too much.

[Emily Littleton] Emily does not glance over at Ashley when she runs off a list of things that might help. She just closes her eyes and tries not to focus on whatever tympanic worry and self-doubt is crescendo-ing through her thoughts just now. After nearly three months of waiting, of trying not to think about things, it's all crashing down on her head and she can't even leave. Tonight is her Chantry rounds.

Instead the girl begins pulling the small clips out of her hair, collecting them in one hand as she works, until her curls tumble down into a mass that can be swept over her shoulder.

"I doubt you'll be able to separate them," Emily says gently. It's just shared information, and it's more than she would offer up of either man's life at another juncture. "They're like brothers. And Owen has already lost -- I just don't think you'll be able to keep them apart, reliably, for more than a few days at a time."

She shrugs a bit.

"I've a few things of Nico's at my place. I offered for him to stay, and he did, but he's never really around. I think he's been couch surfing. Chuck's working on getting his stuff out of storage, and fixing the back rent issue at Nico's flat in Cabrini, but that's slow going."

And there was the matter of three months' back rent that neither Initiate had on hand to cough up and help with. She exhales heavily, and sips from her tea.

"Owen's not, exactly, the easiest person to get along with when he isn't ill," Emily admits. There's no sweetness to this. She doesn't make it easier on the absent Chorister by any measure. "There's always been darkness to him. If you're right, Ash--" here her words still, falter for a moment.

"If you're right, it'll take more than me to pull him out of it. I don't know anyone else who could, beyond Nico, and Nico's in the same place."

[Ashley McGowen] Jacques is going very much out of his way to help a young man who only just came back - a young man who wasn't in the Awakened community here for very long before he left. Jacques is doing a lot for someone he probably doesn't know all that well. That doesn't surprise Ashley; she remembers how he'd been with Dylan. "See what you can do," is all she says to him. "As for separating them...they might cause each other problems or maybe they can help each other through it. I don't know."

She's not a Euthanatos, and she isn't a psychologist. She doesn't even know very much about helping people; all she really has to go off of here is her own experience.

There's a pause when she looks to Emily after the Singer brings up the difficulties that Owen might have. She knows the young man is shy. When she went to visit him at the church there'd been a moment where they'd just stared at each other, because in their reticence and their intensity, at least, they were similar - if not in anything else. "I had the same problem," she says. "I pushed myself to get to know other people and care about them. I didn't have a choice. I doubt he will either."

At which point she reaches behind her for her cup again and wraps a hand around it, holding it but not sipping from it yet. "I'm kind of hoping I'm wrong. But keep an eye on them, in case I'm not."

[Jacques-Marcel] "Separate their living arrangements. Let them breathe without being near one another. Negative only feeds on negative, so if you want to help either of them that way, they're going to need to be pried apart and fill that space with other people and constant stimulation." No, he doesn't mean that sexually. "Distract them. But sure, let them spend time together. Otherwise they'll rebel like teenagers with a curfew."

"I think that's your best bet." Jacques takes in a breath and pushes himself up from the table. "But I really don't know anything about magic and everything else. Only people."

Stepping out from behind his chair, he pushes it back into place and glances over to Ashley. "I wanted to talk to you about that place you mentioned. That's why I'm here, actually." His hands have curled around the back of the chair, and he grips it tighter for a moment, hands flexing. "I thought it was time to face up to what happened with Dylan, but maybe now isn't the time."

Releasing the chair, he steps back. "I can leave my number for you, Emily, and an address, if you'd like to keep in touch? I'll help you however it is that I can."

[Emily Littleton] When Jacques offers her his contact information and assistance, she rises too. Not that she is planning on going anywhere, just that she is trying to be polite and the old mannerisms she has learned in far flung places shine through more, just now, because she is flustered. She is upset and worried. And she is not hiding it as well, tonight, as she otherwise would be.

"Likewise. I'll give you my number, and anything I can do to help you, please, just ask. I'll also let you know when we've made progress on securing some sort of healer or charm for Nico, you'll be among the first to know."

There's a little pause here, and then her expression softens. "At the heart of it, all of this is about people anyway. I think you should give yourself a bit more credit."

Emily doesn't usually offer compliments to strangers. Hopefully Jacques would take it for what it was. They were all, three, over-extending for an Orphan they did not know terribly well. Each for their own reasons. Each to their own ends. Emily hoped that it went well for everyone involved.

"I hope you're wrong, too, Ashley. Either way, though, we've got things to work on. So much for a quiet Autumn." She offered them both a gently rueful smile, though it was good in many ways to have a direction to strive down. It was good to have a task at hand that would hopefully help, not harm, the people she cared about.

[Ashley McGowen] "A Twilight is about someone going through a break with reality," Ashley says, "and Jhor is a form of that. It's about people as much as magic." It might be about people moreso than magic; Ashley isn't really sure on that count. This is the thing about those who have Awakened: they're human, and they react as human beings do to trauma, and they are capable of incredible hubris.

Jacques is rising, though, stepping back. Saying that he's ready to talk about what happened to Dylan. Ashley pauses and looks at him once, chewing on the inside of her lower lip, but at first she says nothing. Until, "If you want to call me soon, we can talk about that," she says, "or you can come and meet me here. But the place isn't built yet. My old cabalmate is coming into town soon to help with its construction."

Bran Summers is a busy man, and they don't quite get along these days. Ashley wouldn't bother him if there was anyone with his knowledge of the Ars Materiae in Chicago. But sometimes these things can't altogether be helped.

"If either of you need help, I'll do what I can. But I don't know a whole lot about this myself, other than what happened to me." She shrugs, once. "I really would suggest talking to Wharil though."

[Jacques-Marcel] Pulling out a card from his wallet, which is produced out of his slack pocket, he lays it on the table and slides it closer to Emily. It has his name on it: Jacques-Marcel, no surname, along with a statement saying: Photographer. There's a cell number and an email address which is based off his name. "Just give me a call or a text, that way I'll have your number," he explains with a small smile.

Folding his wallet closed, he slides it back into his pocket, saying nothing about taking more credit but offering a small nod to it instead. His eyes are kinder in that moment, less professional, before he's looking over at Ashley.

"I'll check back." He's not in a hurry to talk about it, obviously. Now that he knows that the place isn't build yet, he has no plans on returning to the Chantry to discuss Dylan or his involvement, or anything about what had happened. Jacques still has to face it, especially since Nico's predicament is all too similar, and he's willingly placed himself in a very similar position as before. He has to be a masochist.

"It was nice meeting you Emily. You can tell Owen and Nico that you've met me here," he chuckles faintly, "Nico doesn't know that I'm tied into this whole... thing. Hopefully it doesn't make him feel worse." Because things like that happen. The fact that Nico is one of the Magi of the city has already changed Jacques view about him.

Heading for the door, he bids them a: "Have a good evening," and shows himself out.

[Emily Littleton] The once-Orphan slides the card across the table and studies it for a moment before it disappears into one of the pockets of her slacks. She nods when Jacques wishes them a good evening, but does not follow him to the door. She does not feel the need to see him out. She does listen for it to shut behind him before she picks up her tea and brings it back to the kitchen.

"If you'd still like dinner, be my guest," she tells Hunger, but Emily herself has lost her appetite. She rolls up the sleeves of her blouse, washes her mug, sets it out to dry.

"I'll pack the rest up for the rest of the week."

Emily is thoughtful for a moment, then looks back at the Dean. "Whenever you get time, I'd like to go looking for Tass. And help talking to Israel. I think I'm too close to this."

She lets that thought trail off, and really, it's pretty much the last Emily has to offer on the subject beyond quiet company and a pervasive worry. When Ashley leaves, she'll go back upstairs to study. She'll leave a voicemail for Wharil. She'll inform the Virtual Adept of the promises she made on his behalf.

[Jacques-Marcel] (ooc: thanks for the scene!)

[Ashley McGowen] There's a glance toward the spaghetti that is almost mournful, because Ashley would like very much to eat it. She's hungry, and it's been a long time since lunch (but even if it hadn't, she'd still be hungry.) She's left Zane outside, and she keeps a small bag of dog food here for her chantry patrol days; he needs to eat too, after all.

But Emily isn't bothering to hide the fact that this is really bothering her. She's unusually transparent tonight, enough that Ashley can tell that it's bothering her. And with a small handful of people, Ashley does care.

She glances over toward the soccer ball and says, "Still want to play football?" because Emily's expression had brightened when she'd mentioned it in the first place. Because when Kage has had to give Ashley bad news or when Ashley has been under considerable stress around Kage, they play chess, and it helps her keep her mind off of things. She knows this.

[Emily Littleton] Emily offers the football a glance that's almost as mournful as Ashley's pleading one toward the spaghetti. There's a weak smile, fragile and somewhat sad. She shakes her head.

"Another time?" Emily never turns down football, but she will tonight. The Singer whets her lips a little, glances from the ball to her friend. "I should get back to my homework."

The excuse has no teeth, but it gives them both a reason to step away from the uncomfortable conversation and hanging intimations. Studying will give Emily the space she needs to feel safe and separate enough to react. Her absence will let Ashley and Zane eat dinner.

"Cheers, though."

[Ashley McGowen] There aren't any excuses, and Ashley doesn't stare Emily in the face and protest that she needs something to distract herself and shouldn't go up to the library alone. She doesn't even think it, which might surprise most of the people that don't know her well (and even some of the ones who do. There are aspects of who she is that are quite hidden.) She gets it.

"Okay," she says, though there's a flicker of disappointment because she was trying to help, but she lets it subside. While Emily goes upstairs to try to study and distract herself, Ashley helps herself to the food Emily pulled off the stove. She packages the rest and puts it in the refrigerator so that Emily doesn't have to come down and do it later; she's courteous in that, at least.

She has the dog for company, which is just like a night at home. It's not quite the evening she'd hoped for in coming to the chantry. But it's all right; there will be more.